Talkin‘ Politics & Religion Without Killin‘ Each Other

She left the church at twenty-five. She never stopped praying, and she still doesn't know who's listening. Lauren Jackson writes Believing, the New York Times newsletter about how people practice faith and doubt now, and she came to the beat by way of her own departure from the Mormon church she was raised in. Corey talks with her about what secularism can't replace, what AI is quietly taking from...

The founders weren't just the names in the history books. You count as one, and citizenship is something you practice. Lindsey Cormack studies how members of Congress actually talk to the people they represent, and she wrote the book on why civics belongs at home long before it reaches a classroom. Corey sits down with her on what it takes to raise a citizen, why disagreement is where the learning...

Through Psalm 74 and the firebombing of a New Jersey synagogue in 1984, a bar mitzvah season becomes a reckoning with the places we call hallowed and what survives once they've been defiled. A solo reflection on desecration, spectacle, and the unglamorous work of redemption, from an old tavern's charred remains to the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in the year of America's 250th. ✅ If this one lan...

A doctor once told Rich Harwood's mother to face it, her son was a lemon. He's spent his life proving no one is disposable, and that even the most divided towns in America can build something together. Two minutes. Real impact. Leave a review:   lovethepodcast.com/politicsandreligion What does it take to heal a divided town? Less talking, says Rich Harwood. After almost 40 years running the Harwoo...

An off-the-cuff solo update on two essays in the works: one on the sacred spaces we share and what survives their desecration, the other on the real derangement in our politics, told through three men Corey loves and has watched change. Plus the launch of something new for the show, taking the mission to a local pub, the divier the better, to talk politics and religion on camera, over a drink, wit...

Some state lawmakers drive Uber to afford the job. The best of them are walking away. Layla Zaidane runs the largest nonpartisan organization for young lawmakers in the country, and her team's "Exit Interview" found that the most promising bipartisan legislators are leaving office over problems that are entirely fixable. This conversation launches Terms of Service, a new collaboration between Futu...

Through the lens of the Tennessee Williams play, The Glass Menagerie, a morning walk through Washington, from DuPont Circle to the Jefferson Memorial, becomes a reckoning with what we've made of our civic sacred spaces. A solo reflection on desecration, devotion, and a faith in the American experiment that proves harder to walk away from than intended. ✅ If this one landed, leave a quick review s...

“It’s easy to hate things you don’t understand.” Two minutes. Real impact. Leave a review:  lovethepodcast.com/politicsandreligion Kristin Wilson spent three decades producing Washington coverage, including a decade running CNN’s Capitol Hill unit, with stops at NBC, CBS, Nightline, the BBC, and Fox News. Now she’s co-founder and executive producer of 535, a journalist-founded, nonpartisan newsroo...

This was one of our most listened-to conversations of the past year. If you missed it the first time, here's your second chance. She moderated the fly debate. She interviewed Stephen Hawking. She covered 12 presidential campaigns and sat down with the last 10 presidents. And she spent years inside Queen Elizabeth’s extraordinary vantage point on American democracy — one that no American journalist...

What if the way we talk about "the other side" isn't just rude — it's something closer to dehumanization? Consumer and social psychologist Lura Forcum has a precise vocabulary for what's happening, and a clear-eyed prescription for what to do about it. Two minutes. Real impact. Leave a review: lovethepodcast.com/politicsandreligion Lura writes the newsletter How to Human and co-hosts We Made This...

When the theological scrutiny is ferocious for the Democrat and nonexistent for the Republican, you're not watching theology. You're watching idolatry. Two minutes. Real impact. Leave a review:   lovethepodcast.com/politicsandreligion Ken Paxton won the Republican primary for the Texas U.S. Senate seat. He was impeached 121-23 by a Republican-controlled House, divorced on biblical grounds, and cau...

She's a Republican who won't back Trump, and she has no interest in yelling — just winning. Two minutes. Real impact. Leave a review:  lovethepodcast.com/politicsandreligion Susan Del Percio is a crisis communications expert, political analyst, and MS NOW columnist who has publicly opposed Trump since 2015. Corey and Susan dig into the Texas Senate race, how vulnerable Republicans navigate a MAGA...

In 2024, just 18% of Americans said religion is gaining influence. Then came the double-digit jump. Pew Research's Chip Rotolo has the numbers — and they're striking. Two minutes. Real impact. Leave a review:  lovethepodcast.com/politicsandreligion Chip Rotolo is a research associate at Pew Research Center studying religion's role in public life. His team's latest report finds a sharp reversal in...

Originally aired in January, back by popular demand. Two minutes. Real impact. Leave a review:  lovethepodcast.com/politicsandreligion What happens when a nation debates whether it has a moral obligation to intervene in the suffering of others — and who gets to decide? Corey is joined by Pulitzer Prize–finalist historian and bestselling author H.W. Brands, Jack S. Blanton Sr. Chair in History at t...

Two minutes. Real impact. Leave a review: lovethepodcast.com/politicsandreligion What if the outrage itself is the addiction? In this solo episode, Corey Nathan draws on scripture, neuroscience, Dr. Seuss, and two very personal stories to ask a harder question than who’s right: are we more hooked on the fight than committed to what the fight is supposed to be about? From a son’s vaccine hesitancy...

“Often predictions try to pass as descriptions of the world or facts when actually they are something like power plays in disguise.” — Carissa Véliz Reviews are the lifeblood of independent podcasts. If TP&R belongs in more people's ears, here's how you make that happen: Apple Podcasts:  Rate & Review on Apple Spotify:  Rate on Spotify When a tech executive declares that AI will transform...

Sometimes you're in a room full of people you love — and all you can hear is the wind. May is Mental Health Awareness Month. This episode is a solo one — no guest, no debate, no conversation across political or religious difference. Just Corey, a piece he wrote in the middle of some darkness, and the motorcycle he never really got off. "A Thousand Miles Away" is an essay about Bipolar disorder, ab...

Some kids from Jersey go down the Shore. Tom Mangine went to West Point, then to the Balkans, then Haiti, then Africa, then Chile — and somehow managed to be on the ground every time history got loud.   Reviews are the lifeblood of independent podcasts. If TP&R belongs in more people's ears, here's how you make that happen: Apple Podcasts:  Rate & Review on Apple Spotify:  Rate on Spotify...

"Saying the pledge now isn't capitulation. It's repossession." Reviews are the lifeblood of independent podcasts. If TP&R belongs in more people's ears, here's how you make that happen: Apple Podcasts: Rate & Review on Apple Spotify: Rate on Spotify For 15 years, Corey stood during the Pledge of Allegiance without putting his hand on his heart or saying the words. It wasn't apathy, and it...

“For Jefferson, Hamilton is not a hated enemy to be opposed or destroyed, but a respected adversary to be debated with. And that is the spirit we have to get back to today.” — Jeffrey Rosen Jeffrey Rosen is one of the most respected constitutional scholars in America — CEO Emeritus of the National Constitution Center, professor of law at George Washington University Law School, contributing editor...

Most of us are going to be disappointed. The question is whether that disappointment has to mean paralysis. Corey Nathan recently joined Michael Baranowski on The Politics Guys for a conversation that refuses to offer easy comfort or easy despair. The 2026 midterms are the jumping-off point: what's likely, what's actually at stake, and whether a Democratic wave would change much of anything. But t...

He held a knife to his father's throat and felt, in that same moment, something he could only call love. That paradox — and the lifelong journey it set in motion — is what this conversation is about. Jaime Encinas is an entrepreneur, author, and spiritual leader whose life has been shaped by trauma, healing, and the hard work of breaking cycles. Founder of Wheeling to Healing and a fellow with WEA...

For a significant plurality of those who voted for Donald Trump in 2024, it all really comes down to one thing. Owning the Libs. So what price is anyone willing to pay for that? The question "at what cost" doesn't belong to one side of the aisle. In this solo episode of TP&R Uninterrupted, Corey Nathan turns the lens on both Trump loyalists and progressive purists, arguing that the price of pe...

"We're living in this collective illusion where the extremes are mischaracterizing who we are as a people." More than 70% of Americans — across every demographic — say their deepest aspiration is to contribute to the lives of others. Most of them think they're alone in that. They're not. Brian Hooks, Chairman and CEO of Stand Together, joins the show to make the case that the country's most urgent...

Two-thirds of Americans are exhausted by a political narrative that doesn’t match how they actually see the world. Jason Mangone has the data to prove it and a roadmap for what to do about it. Jason Mangone is the executive director of More in Common US, the American arm of a global organization founded after the assassination of British MP Jo Cox — whose maiden speech in Parliament included the l...